


art imitates life again (we could toe the line)

by sandpapersnowman



Category: Creep (2014), Creep (Movies), Creep 2 (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Awkward Boners, Blood and Gore, Character Study, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, F/M, Gen, Graphic Description, Murder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-25
Updated: 2018-05-25
Packaged: 2019-05-13 14:39:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14750804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sandpapersnowman/pseuds/sandpapersnowman
Summary: He hasn't stopped shaking since they pulled up to the bar. It's shitty, and looks trashy, and kind of looks like it could collapse into a pile of wood and metal and nobody could tell the difference.All things considered? It's perfect.





	art imitates life again (we could toe the line)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sanguiniel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanguiniel/gifts).



> uhhhhhhhhh. this happened in two hours and I am Sorry
> 
> the violence is . described but could be more explicit, but is still gross. you can read them as romantically involved or not 
> 
> title bastardized from the wombats' [Ice Cream](https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/wombats/icecream.html)
> 
> also obvs like... its not really Aaron in this fic lmao its Josef calling himself Aaron

If she was still filming, she might be sick. This goes beyond assisted suicide, or even witnessing a suicide without intervening. This is really, truly, full-consequence _murder_.

Guess it’s for the better that she stopped filming a long time ago.

"Him," Aaron says suddenly. "Him, I can -- I can feel it," he admits. "Do you see it? The way the light hits him differently?"

_No_ , she wants to say, but maybe the lighting in here _is_ a little dim in places.

"Yeah," she says, surprising herself.

Aaron takes her hand across the table and squeezes it in his, briefly stabilizing his shaky fingers in her calm ones.

"This is going to be so fun," he whispers. "He's going to look gorgeous spread open for us, I promise."

She smiles -- because of how sexual that would sound if anyone could hear him, not because she's looking forward to it. She doesn't know if she's looking forward to this, not at all, but that isn't going to stop her now.

They both slip out of their booth and follow the man when he goes to the bathroom. She's tall enough and androgynous enough, they had decided, that with her hair tucked into a hat and some baggy clothes, she could slip into the men's room with him without drawing too much attention. Sure enough, nobody seems to notice them, and he takes her hand again when they step inside.

She can feel his pulse racing through his fingers. Is it because he's about to take someone's life? Or because she's there, witnessing it? Some exhibitionist combination of both?

He takes a shaky breath.

The three of them are the only ones in the bathroom. Aaron walks forward toward the man at the urinal, out of her grasp, and she twists the deadbolt on the door to give them more time.

Aaron, politely enough, waits until the man finishes peeing. It takes the man that long to realize something's up, too, and he's just starting to zip up his pants when he asks "What the fuck do y'all want?"

Aaron covers his mouth first; no screams, no problems. Then he knees into the backs of the guy's legs, forcing him to kneel on the crappy green tile.

She steps forward to grab his arms and hands, keep him from grabbing at Aaron too, but Aaron is pulling his head back hard enough that they're distracted trying to get _his_ hands off of him.

"Get his belt," Aaron says, and he doesn't have to tell her its for his wrists.

He swats at her when she tries to get his arms, and even though he doesn't hit her, Aaron yanks his hair hard enough a scream muffles in his palm.

She grabs his wrists then and Aaron steps to his side so she can yank them behind his back. She goes slowly so Aaron can move with her, and it takes her foot between his shoulder blades to get his wrists close enough to quickly loop the belt over. 

"Put it under his wrists and then wrap each end around once," he says, as casually as though he's telling her the weather. It's a pain with him trying to get away, but she manages. "Pull it real tight."

She manages to do what he describes, barely, and the guy cries out at the pull and friction against his skin when she tightens it, but he still doesn't stop struggling.

"Good girl," Aaron praises. "Loop it again if you can, and then buckle it."

"Got it," she says, yanking the leather again once it's through the buckle, and the pain from friction and something too tight around a limb throws the guy off, but not enough. "Put him on the floor for me, I can't get the thing in with him being an asshole."

Aaron laughs. He checks her hands to make sure she's got a hold on the end of the belt, then maneuvers him to the floor with her.

She straddles the backs of his legs for ease, Aaron still knelt down to keep his mouth covered even with his head pinned to the tile.

She finally gets the prong through a hole, and slips the end back through the buckle for good measure.

She cautiously lets go and looks up at Aaron to see if she's done it right, and he's _beaming_.

"Atta girl, that looks _great_ ," he gushes. "You still have the bandanas?"

She nods. She's wearing a baggy hoodie to help disguise herself, and he had slipped three bandanas into her pocket before they left for the bar.

"Do you want to cover his mouth for me or do you want to do the next part?"

As much as this trip was supposed to be for him, he's genuinely asking how much she'd like to participate or not. She appreciates that, somehow -- they have a man bound and soon-to-be gagged on a filthy bar floor, and he's trying to make sure she's only doing as much as she's comfortable.

"I'll do these," she decides. Switching off hands might give the guy a chance to scream, and she doesn't want to risk it.

Aaron nods.

"Okay, good." He pulls the guy back up to his knees, getting his face off the tile. "I want you to take two and ball them up for me first. Not too tight, because we don't want him to choke, but not too loose because we _do_ want to block off sound."

She does, and holds the tense but not taut ball of cloth in her hand for him to judge.

" _Perfect_ ," he says. "God, I love you _so_ much," he sighs, sounding pretty lovesick for someone with both hands holding down a hostage.

"Thanks," she says. (The sense of pride is because she's adjusting to this role, not because she's glad she's doing well. This isn't _her_ , this is... This is the journalist with the murderer.)

"So what we're gonna do next is -- I'm gonna choke him to keep him quiet and I can keep his jaw open for you so he won't bite, and you'll put the ball in." He makes sure she nods before he continues. "Then we tie the third bandana around his mouth to keep them in, and then neither of us has to hold onto him."

She nods again, barely tucking the tying bandana into her pocket so she can grab it fast without needing to hold it.

"Ready when you are."

His expression melts one more time into something unbearably fond, and then he nods back.

His hand moves to the man's throat and squeezes, focused on his windpipe rather than blood. She knows that's riskier, because he could squeeze too hard and he could suffocate on his own broken throat, but she trusts Aaron to have done this enough not to snap anything. At the same time, she goes for his mouth; with only one hand holding the squished bandanas, she can use the other to hold his jaw open while she stuffs them in.

"Not too far down, just --"

"-- Just enough he can't push them out with his tongue, I know."

Aaron's eyes widen in delight that they're on the same page, and finishing each other's _sentences_ , even, but she keeps carefully pushing the bandanas in.

She lets go of his jaw and whips the third bandana out of her pocket.

She has to stand too close to Aaron to tie it at the back of his head, leaned against his side while he keeps one hand in his hair and one hand on his throat, and he feels like he's on _fire_. She bets she could hear his heartbeat pound if it weren't for the struggling, awful wheezing echoing in the bathroom, and the way he leans into her too makes her realize her heart is pounding just as fast as his must be.

Of course it is, she rationalizes. She's doing illegal shit with someone that's 99% probably a serial killer.

She ties a knot with the ends of the bandana, just in case, and Aaron mutters _perfect_ again to let her know it's secure.

They both step back from him at the same time, and for a second, it's like they're admiring their work; this man is on his knees, bound and gagged and gasping. Tears are just beginning to slide down his cheeks, they change course where the grouted tile has left marks over his skin.

He tries to stand again, and Aaron is pulling his legs out from under him before he's got one foot flat on the ground.

The position Aaron puts him in can't be comfortable -- laying on hard tile would be uncomfortable even without your own tied wrists digging into your back -- but it works for what they need him for. It's probably even less comfortable with the added weight of Aaron straddling him.

He doesn't bother pulling the guy's shirt up and off him. He pulls out a knife, instead, one that looks kind of old but well-kept, like he's had it for years, and dips it under the hem.

"Do you have a preference for whether or not the shirt stays intact?" he asks. Aaron's still staring at the man, probably right in the eye, if his confused expression is anything to go by, but he's asking Sara.

"I don't care," she says. She suspects Aaron probably wants to tear the shirt off of him, the first truly feral act of the night, and she's proven right when he jabs the knife up through cotton.

The guy whines with every rip and shred, Aaron still hovering the knife too close to his skin as he jerks the shirt open and cuts where he needs, even nicking him once or twice. Short lines of blood bead up on his ribs as Aaron works higher up his chest, until finally, he saws through the hem of the guy's shirt with a flourish far too close to his throat.

Aaron swallows like he's drooling over this, and Sara knows he probably is.

"What happens next?" she asks quietly.

He looks up at her with stars in his eyes. She's still here, stoic but curious at his side, where no one else has ever stood.

"You know what happens next," he says, his voice soft and dreamy like it had been when he suggested they kill themselves together. The same in-awe adoration he had when she suggested they kill someone _else_ together, instead, and his eyes lit up.

The man struggles more, realizing something _bad_ is about to happen, whatever bad thing they tied him up and pinned him for.

He pitches up against Aaron to try to throw him off, but Aarons breath catches.

_Jesus. He's hard._

She had her suspicions about it, if there was any sexual nature to his urges, but she thought he would have mentioned that before now. 

Guess not.

Aaron swallows.

"You've done so well tonight," he starts to say to Sara, his voice thick. He glances at the man under him and adds a lighthearted "you, too!"

He wants to ask if she wants to do it, but she can see the conflict in his eyes -- he hasn't been passionate about a kill in so long, she remembers, and now he's right back in the saddle.

"This is for you," she reminds him, answering the question before he forces himself to ask.

She's not sure if she doesn't because she's still a semi-moral human being, or if it's truly because tonight _is_ for Aaron.

(She's also not sure how uncomfortable she is with _not_ being sure about that.)

Aaron sighs in relief, a weight leaving his shoulders that she hadn't noticed building.

"Thank you," he whispers, like he's been starving and she's given him a feast. "I love you so much," he says again.

He doesn't waste a second.

The knife jams into the man's chest, just under his ribs. He cuts down like he's gutting him, despite the improper angle for it, and she watches in fascination as the blood slides out. It's so strange to think that so much was there already when it looks like it's being conjured from nothing.

The man was screaming, first roars in his makeshift gag and then weak whimpers, but shock or blood loss wins out quickly over consciousness. Despite his struggling, his organs are still mostly within the cavity on the floor that used to be a person, and it's a strange sight to watch blood pool over intestine and neat lumps of flesh like water sliding over ice.

"He'll be gone in a moment," Aaron says, his voice still rough. "Do you mind if -- I just need to..."

He doesn't finish asking or convincing her, the knife already clattering to the floor so he can push both hands into the mess.

Distantly, she can't believe he hasn't been caught yet with the amount of DNA he must leave, but she can't be too judgmental when she's kind of curious about doing the same. His arms stain red, and she imagines he must be feeling the final beats of the man's heart while he still can.

They breath at the same time -- the man on the floor exhales his last unconscious breath at the same time Aaron sighs out shaky and nearly sobbing.

He stays for another moment, bent at his waist and elbow-deep in viscera, his face hovering over a dead one too closely. Too _intimately_.

He whispers another quiet _thank you_ , this time to the corpse, and slowly pulls his arms out.

Sara gives him another breath before she speaks.

"How do you feel?"

He surveys the damage in front of him. A dead man has handkerchiefs stuffed over his tongue to silence him, his own belt is wearing burns into his wrists, and his blood has begun to slowly, loudly drip into the drain in the center of the room. Aaron himself is, frankly, _coated_ , covered crotch to collarbone in red and probably knee to ankle, too, from kneeling in the puddle. He wears blood so thick up his arms they look like princess gloves, and his fingers don't shake like they had when they took her hand ten minutes ago.

God, has it only been ten minutes?

He looks up at her with wet eyes, and answers with the only definite truth she's heard from him since they met.

"Alive."

**Author's Note:**

> feel free to yell at me via my [tumblr](https://www.sandpapersnowman.tumblr.com)


End file.
